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Guelph Politico is locally sourced and dedicated to covering the political and cultural scene in the City of Guelph. Est. 2008.

Monday, June 12, 2017

GUELPH POLITICAST #82 - Linda Terry, Social Planning Council of Cambridge and North Dumfries

"If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich." John F. Kennedy said that, and it seems a fitting reminder that our tremendous financial inequality in modern society is far from sustainable. Someone said a long time ago that you will always have the poor among you, but that doesn't mean that we have to prove him right. Though as he sit here in the year 2017, the poor is still among us, and we seem no closer to a solution.

Numerous social service and activism groups have been trying to find ways to undo the stranglehold of poverty for decades, but the Social Planning Council of Cambridge and North Dumfries realizes that they need a key partner to make real change happen: the media. Their 12th annual Poverty Symposium will focus on the topic, "Solutions to Poverty Includes Media", and will bring together a variety of media representatives to talk about how media can be used to increase awareness and action on poverty and related issues. Guelph Politico will represent the "new media" there.

So as a bit of prep work before the symposium, I asked Linda Terry, the executive director of the SPCCND to join me on the podcast to talk about her organization's work to combat poverty, how the media has shown in can make an impact in the recent past, and the difficulties in making an issue as big and multifaceted as poverty a media priority. As recently demonstrated, it's clear that this topic has struck a chord in our own committee, the need to talk about poverty and its effects more, so I hope that this podcast, and the symposium Thursday, starts a grand discussion about how local media can best help society's most vulnerable.

So let's talk about anti-poverty activism, the media, and how we can help each other on this week's Guelph Politicast!

The 12th annual Poverty Symposium "Solutions to Poverty Includes Media" takes place this Thursday at 8:30 am at the Preston Memorial Auditorium, 1458 Hamilton Street in Cambridge. To register on Event Brite, click here. To learn more about the work of the Social Planning Council of Cambridge and North Dumfries you can visit their website here.

The theme music for the Guelph Politicast is from the KPM Klassics collection by Syd Dale.

The host for the Guelph Politicast is Podbean. Find more episodes of the Politicast here.

Remember that the Politicast Podbean channel is also the host for podcast versions of Open Sources Guelph. The previous Thursday's episode of Open Sources will be posted on Mondays.***UPDATE - 06/14: Evidently a few people were offended by the direct reference to a religious figure in the original introduction to this post. In the effort to make sure the real message of this podcast and this event doesn't get lost, I altered it on this day.